Medical treatment often requires the administration of a therapeutic agent (e.g., medicament, drugs, etc.) to a particular part of a patient's body. As patients live longer and are diagnosed with chronic and/or debilitating ailments, the need to place even more protein therapeutics, small-molecule drugs, and other medications into targeted anatomical areas will only increase. Some maladies, however, are difficult to treat with currently available therapies and/or require administration of drugs to difficult-to-reach anatomical regions. Many of these therapies would benefit from concentrated target-area treatment, which would reduce systemic side effects. Furthermore, certain drugs such as protein therapeutics are expensive, costing thousands of dollar per vial. For these reasons, new and improved approaches to targeted drug delivery are constantly sought.
Implantable drug-delivery devices with refillable drug reservoirs address and overcome many of the problems associated with conventional drug-delivery modalities. They generally facilitate controlled delivery of pharmaceutical solutions to a specified target. As the contents of the drug reservoir deplete, a clinician may refill the reservoir in situ, i.e., while leaving the device implanted within the patient's body.
Monitoring and controlling the administration of pharmaceuticals can be critically important, particularly when implanted drug pump are utilized, as such devices may often not be constantly closely monitored. Thus, implantable drug pumps would benefit from autonomous safeguards sufficient to ensure proper dosing and performance monitoring. Furthermore, the drug reservoirs of implantable pumps are likely to be of limited size and their contents would ideally be monitored to ensure timely refilling or replacement.
Accordingly, there is a need for implantable pumps that incorporate sensors for monitoring various parameters related to pump performance and drug administration.